Life Is Like A Boat
by pale rose fire
Summary: When Kuroko quits basketball after middle school and leaves Tokyo to get away from the memories he finds himself in Iwatobi. A new team and new friends with their own scars from the past are the last things he wants or needs, but before he knows it, the tides of fate are sweeping him along on a journey to find just where he belongs.
1. Wash Clean The Slate

Disclaimer: I don't own Free! or Kuroko no Basuke

Rated T mainly for Rin's pottymouth at times

This fic's set in an AU where Kuroko quit basketball after middle school and left Tokyo to get away from the memories. He ended up going to Iwatobi, got caught up in the Swim Club's drama, and found new teammates and friends in them and their rivals, helping them heal from the scars of their past as they helped him. (This is the same AU I used for my oneshot "Kuroko no Free," which is Chapter 6 of my oneshot collection fic 'A Different Side of Me.' The chapters of this fic will skip around the "Kuroko no Free" timeline, taking place before, during, and after the original oneshot. Reading the original isn't strictly necessary but will probably be helpful, since I'll be skipping around. But this first chapter does actually begin at the beginning.)

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Chapter 1: Wash Clean The Slate

Kuroko stared into the mirror. A dead eyed boy in a crisp new uniform stared back at him. Iwatobi High's uniform, like Teikou's, consisted of a jacket and tie, and dress pants, but the look of it was very different. The jacket was dark, unremarkable, unlike the pristine, blinding white of Teiko's jacket. His shirt was a plain white collar shirt. The cut of both were more casual than Teiko's. His tie was a little eschew, so Kuroko started to straighten it, out of reflex, even though no one was going to see it. But his arms seemed to lose strength as he gripped the knot and he just let them fall back down.

Because really, what was the point of this all? What was the point of any of this?

His futon beckoned from the corner of his one room apartment. The only thing that seemed remotely appealing to him now was crawling back into bed and trying to drift off into the oblivion of sleep. That was the only time he wasn't weighed down by loneliness, guilt and sorrow – when he was blacked out.

Waking hours were filled with thoughts of friends lost, and regrets. Kuroko had fled Tokyo to try to get away from them all, choosing his high school by throwing darts at a map. Yesterday, before school actually started, he'd had a little bit of hope that things would be better once he'd attended, and was officially a first year at Iwatobi High. Now Kuroko felt stupid for thinking that they would ever be better. He could run away from people and places, but not the guilt that was inside. And the loneliness? There was no cure for that. Not for someone who no one could see. It was like his first year of middle school, and all the years of elementary school, all over again. Not a single person noticed him on their own yesterday. His teachers had all nearly missed him when taking attendance, and only Kuroko standing up and calling out loudly made them see him. To every other student, he was invisible. Lunch time had been spent by himself on the roof, staring out at the sea as though it might hold the answer he was looking for. And maybe it did, but like everyone and everything else it didn't speak to Kuroko. Not that day, anyway.

Kuroko summoned all his strength and walked out his apartment door. If he waited any longer, he'd be late. His steps were slower than they used to be. Kuroko knew he'd gotten weaker since last year, when everything fell apart. He'd lost weight. Muscle mass, for the most part. Now he was tired just about all the time. Once, he could have jogged the whole way to school without breaking enough of a sweat that he'd need to change. Once he could have walked the distance in a third of the time it took him now. But not now.

Kuroko was just so tired, all the time, of everything.

He was almost late. As he neared the school, he tried to walk a little faster, seeing that all of the other students were already inside. Hurrying as fast as he was able to, Kuroko stored his shoes in his shoe locker, then tried to leave the locker area, to get to his homeroom. But as he stepped across the threshold, Kuroko nearly collided with an upperclassman. A huge upperclassman, who filled out his school jacket the way only someone with an unbelievable amount of muscles could manage to. He was about a head taller than Kuroko, and didn't see him at all, so he would have kept on going and plowed Kuroko right over before realizing he was there, and Kuroko wouldn't have been able to get out of the way in time, or even speak up in alarm. But then –

"Makoto, stop."

An arm flung out in front of the huge upperclassman, stopping him short, just shy of bumping into Kuroko.

Kuroko froze, feeling numb.

"What is it Haru?" asked Makoto, looking at his friend in confusion.

Haru was on the tall side, but didn't look that way compared to Makoto. Much the way Kuroko was a perfectly average height, but had always been dwarfed by hanging around stupidly tall basketball players. He had black hair and intense blue eyes that were looking right at Kuroko.

He sees me, realized Kuroko in surprise. Or something close to surprise. He couldn't bring himself to care enough to be truly surprised.

Instead of telling Makoto that he'd nearly run into Kuroko, Haru pointed instead. Makoto followed his finger, and his eyes landed on Kuroko and widened.

"Oh! I'm sorry! I didn't even see you there!" Makoto said, looking both alarmed and rueful. "Sorry about that!"

"It's fine," said Kuroko after he got over the mild shock of being seen by someone before they'd run into him.

"I guess I wasn't paying attention, too worried about being late," Makoto said. "Thanks Haru, I would definitely have run into him otherwise."

Haru nodded slightly, but he was still looking at Kuroko. There was something weird about his gaze, but Kuroko didn't know what. Other than the fact that it could apparently see him. And that his eyes were the same exact same shade as the ocean Kuroko had spent all lunch yesterday staring at. Having eyes like that fixed on him, when he'd gone so long without anyone looking at him, was unnerving, even for Kuroko. Not that anyone would be able to tell by looking at him. His face remained completely blank as he gave Haru a nod of thanks then took his leave without another word.

"Wah! Where'd he go?" wondered Makoto out loud, realizing he was gone.

"Probably to class," said Haru, instead of pointing out that Kuroko was still within view. And Kuroko knew Haru could see him.

"Oh. Right. We better go too. Come on, Haru."

* * *

Right before Haru and Makoto entered their homeroom, Haru stopped Makoto, not with a touch or a word, but just by stopping before he crossed the threshold, trusting Makoto, so in tune with him, would realize what he wanted. And he did. Makoto stopped as well.

"What's wrong, Haru?"

"That boy had eyes like the ocean," answered Haru.

"Hm? Yeah, I guess they were pretty blue, weren't they?"

"That's not what I meant."

Makoto tilted his head a little bit, quizzically, trying to puzzle it out. He didn't like to admit it when he didn't understand his best friend. Eyes like the ocean, but not because they were blue? What was it, then? Makoto started mentally going over things that he associated with the ocean. Deep. Dark, sometimes. Full of water. Going from that vein, he knew Haru fully believed water was alive. But he wasn't sure if that was relevant right now. He tried to recall how the underclassman's eyes had looked, but the image wouldn't come to his mind.

Now that he thought about it, something about that kid had been off. Or odd. Both, really. He was short, but not that short. Makoto should have seen him. Had seen him after Haru pointed him out, and had gotten a clear look at his face, but now he could barely remember it.

The bell rang. Any explanations would have to wait until lunch.

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(The title of this fic is based off a song by Rie Fu of the same name: "Life Is Like A Boat.")

Please review!


	2. The Invisible Fifth Man

The Invisible Fifth Man (Of The Iwatobi Swim Club)

(AKA Haru's Thoughts On Tetsuya)

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The first time Haru saw Kuroko, he almost didn't pay any attention to him. People in general didn't interest him much. There was something Haru understood that no one else could get, and there were days it seemed like everyone in the world was trying to make him forget how to understand it too.

Well, everyone in the world except Makoto, that is.

He wouldn't have given Kuroko Tetsuya a second glance, if Makoto hadn't nearly run the kid over. But there were few things Haru cared about and even fewer people, and since Makoto ranked at the very top of that short list, even higher than Haru's own parents, he stopped Makoto reflexively. Otherwise Makoto would have felt bad for weeks about sending the skinny boy crashing into the shoe lockers.

He didn't expect to feel any sort of connection with Kuroko Tetsuya. It came as a surprise to him when he made eye contact with the shorter teen and felt a pang in his chest.

It was hard to describe with words just what he felt, but if Haru had been forced to make the attempt, he would have said something like the feeling he got looking into Kuroko's eyes was the same one he got when he was standing at the edge of the ocean, looking at the horizon, which seemed to go on and on forever. A feeling of being really small. Not necessarily insignificant but sort of powerless in the face of all that's out there in the world, from the tides, to the winds, and the deep ocean depths. Things much greater than you, that you can't affect in any way, that you can't be a part of, no matter how much you want to. And there was also a feeling of longing, something tugging in your chest, because you're missing something, and it's far, far away.

That was the feeling Haru got when he looked into Kuroko's eyes. It took him almost until he reached his homeroom to realize that he'd been empathizing with Kuroko. That was what Kuroko was feeling. And even though Haru knew that a lot of people had their own problems, and that their problems had nothing to do with him, and so he didn't care about them, Haru couldn't help but feel, well, intrigued.

* * *

He started noticing Kuroko around school after that. In the hallways, on the roof at lunch, once at the grocery store, where Kuroko was mechanically filling a shopping basket with instant ramen, a lone carton of eggs sticking out of the basket haphazardly. Something else he noticed was that no one else seemed to notice Kuroko. Haru's first reaction was to be envious. Imagine what he could do with that skill, and all the places he could swim without anyone stopping him? But then, he realized something that left a bad taste in his mouth: Kuroko didn't have a Makoto. Kuroko didn't have anyone.

But it wasn't his problem. And Haru had no idea how to go about fixing something like that, even if he wanted to. But when they formed the swim club and needed a fourth member, Haru found himself zeroing in on Kuroko, who stood unnoticed in the hallway.

"Hey. Join the swim club."

Kuroko, not that Haru knew his name was Kuroko at that time, looked at Haru with confusion. Then he looked a little to the left and the right, like he thought Haru was talking to someone else. Finally, after failing to see any other candidates, Kuroko looked back at Haru.

"Are . . . you talking to me?"

"Yes," said Haru, trying not to get lost in those eyes that were so full of all the feelings that came with the ocean. And, ignoring Makoto and Nagisa who had been looking at him like he was crazy, but had just jumped and were now staring at Kuroko goggle-eyed, realizing he'd been there the whole time. "Join the swim club and I'll give you this."

He dangled his bait before the boy. One of the Iwatobi-chan keychains he'd painstakingly carved.

Interest spread across Kuroko's face at the sight of the adorable little penguin. He wanted the keychain. Haru could tell. He really wanted the keychain.

But he resisted.

"I don't swim very well. I'm sorry, senpai."

Haru would not give up so easily. This boy was the most promising candidate he'd found so far. For some reason he was the only one who'd been even a little tempted by the penguin keychains. And his protest seemed weaker than the others Haru had heard. More like he was trying to find a reason to turn down the offer than giving an excuse.

So Haru shot his reason down. "You'll get better."

"I really won't," said Kuroko. And his eyes didn't so much start to look more like the ocean as feel more like it, like the feelings that came from the ocean. That longing.

"Please." Haru wasn't sure why he said that. Or what he meant by it. But since he'd spoken, he had to follow up on it. "We need one more person to form the club. Otherwise we can't swim."

That was the moment something cracked in Kuroko's eyes, like ice that had too much weight put on it. He stared at Haru with something similar to sad wonder, but Haru couldn't understand why.

For a long time he stared at Haru. Usually, Haru would have written someone off for going that long without answering. But Kuroko's ocean eyes held him spellbound until he finally gave his answer.

"I'll think about it," he said with his voice.

"I want to do this," he said with his eyes.

So it was with no surprise that, the next day, Kuroko appeared in Haru's homeroom, nearly giving Makoto a heart attack in the process of handing in his application. It was only then that Haru learned his name, by reading it off the club application.

After handing in the application, instead of departing, the smaller boy remained, holding his hand out. Makoto looked at him, confused, but Haru knew what he wanted. He reached into his bag and pulled out one of the Iwatobi-chan keychains. Tetsuya had definitely earned it.

* * *

Out of curiosity, would you guys prefer that I start referring to Kuroko as 'Tetsuya' all the time, since that's what all the characters are going to be calling him and thinking of him as, or would you rather I only call him 'Tetsuya' when I'm writing from their point of view?


	3. Light To The Unaware

(This chapter skips forward in time to after the end of Free! Season 1, to the events in "Kuroko no Free" when the bus full of kindergarteners crashes off a bridge into the ocean, and Kuroko, who between last chapter and this one, has trained and become very good at free diving. This is Rin's side of the bridge incident.)

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Chapter 3: Light To The Unaware

When Rin pulled Tetsuya to the surface, he immediately knew it was bad. Rin could tell at a glance that the younger boy wasn't breathing, and Tetsuya's skin, already far too pale, was turning blue. His lips were tinged with the cold color, and beneath his eyes were very pale blue circles, where most people got dark circles when they were too tired.

"Shit!" cursed Rin, kicking as hard as he could, trying to drag his precious burden to the boat that had come to help, when the boat owner saw that school bus drive off the side of the bridge. Belatedly, he remembered the school bus driver, who Tetsuya had made that final dive back down to save. But he needn't have wasted time thinking about him. Tetsuya's wrist was clamped around the bus driver's, his grip like iron even in unconsciousness. That kid's resolve was the stuff of legend. No one could have predicted from looking at him just how incredible he was.

Not that Rin had time to muse over that now. Not now, with Tetsuya laying there, unbreathing in his arms.

A splash caught his attention. Nitori just dove back into the water and was swimming toward him to help. Not that Rin needed it. He would have preferred that Nitori stay in the boat to help him haul Tetsuya and the bus driver up when he reached it, but there was nothing he could do about that now. Rather than waste breath on it, he only nodded in thanks to Nitori when his kouhai reached him and tried to take the bus driver.

Amusingly, he had to pry Tetsuya's fingers free, one by one. At any other time, Rin would have probably laughed. But now the situation was too grave.

Annoyance flared inside him when he saw that the small boat owner's son, or nephew, or apprentice, or whatever, was filming them on his cell phone rather than helping. Even when Rin reached the boat, instead of putting down his stupid phone and helping them up, the idiot kept filming. The boat owner himself seemed to have his hands full of sobbing kindergarteners, so Rin had to wait until Nitori reached him, then shoved Tetsuya toward him.

"Keep his head up," ordered Rin, then he hauled himself quickly out of the water and reached back down for Tetsuya.

The smaller boy's skin was slippery, but thankfully Tetsuya wasn't very heavy, even with all the muscles that swimming had blessed him with. Rin didn't have time to be overly gentle, but he took enough care to make sure that he didn't hit Tetsuya's head on anything when he laid him down on the deck. Then he reached back down to grab the unconscious bus driver and haul him out too. Nitori clambered onto the deck right after him.

"Check the bus driver. I've got Tetsuya," said Rin urgently as he dropped to his knees beside the smaller boy. He placed two fingers against Tetsuya's throat, trying to find a pulse. "Come on. Come on."

Tetsuya hadn't been under very long, on this last dive. Relatively speaking. He had breathed in water and drowned, Rin knew, but he hadn't gone without breathing _that_ long. He should have still had a heartbeat. But he didn't. Rin's panic grew as he failed to find even a thready pulse. Then he stomped it down and proceeded to administer CPR, mentally blessing his former captain, Mikoshiba, for requiring all Samezuka swimmers to pass a lifeguard certification test. Without that, Rin would have only been relying on scant knowledge from health class and trying to imitate how he'd seen people do it on TV.

Beside him, Nitori was doing the same to the bus driver. Rin could hear him counting as he pressed down on the older man's chest, trying to get his heart to restart.

This is going to be awkward when you wake up to me putting my lips on yours, thought Rin at Tetsuya, giving him some emergency breaths then returning to chest compressions. I just hope you don't throw up into my mouth, because I'll probably throw up right back on you.

Naturally, Tetsuya didn't answer, since Rin hadn't spoken aloud, and he wasn't even conscious to begin with.

After a few moments, the bus driver was coughing up water and swearing, Nitori talking to him soothingly, telling him everything was going to be alright, and that he was okay now. And Tetsuya was still just lying there on the deck, looking even paler and more like a drowned corpse, and Rin was growing more and more panicked.

"Come on. Come on, Tetsuya," Rin muttered as he gave him more chest compressions. "Breathe, damn you."

"Rin-senpai?" Nitori asked hesitantly.

"He's not fucking breathing! It's not fucking working!" Rin shouted.

Nitori dropped to his knees beside Tetsuya's head and took over rescue breathing, taking care to readjust Tetsuya's head, and making sure the airway was open before proceeding. Rin realized that he'd never tried that and wanted to kick himself. If that's what the problem was . . . if he'd screwed up, then it was his fault Tetsuya was still going without oxygen.

"Please wake up," said Rin, giving him more chest compressions. "Please, Tetsuya. You've got to wake up."

Nitori checked for a pulse then shook his head and breathed for Tetsuya again.

"Are you sure that's going to work?" asked the boat owner's son/nephew/idiot.

"Shut up," growled Rin.

"Because he looks dead."

"I said shut up!"

"Rin-senpai, calm down," Nitori said, showing spine in the face of their current emergency.

Rin grit his teeth and went back to work.

Tetsuya had to be alright. He had to.

As the wrecked school bus sank lower and lower, it had been Tetsuya who'd dived down time and again, deeper and deeper, making sure that all the kids and the driver had gotten out of it. Even when it sunk too deep for Rin to make it down again, Tetsuya had still made three more dives, pulling people out each time. The skills he'd honed for free diving had served him well, saving those people. But now, Rin realized with horror, they were probably what was killing him.

Tetsuya had spent the better part of the past twenty minutes underwater, using his free diving skills, surfacing sporadically. The carbon dioxide had to have been building up inside his blood stream, essentially working toward smothering him before he actually drowned. Was it already too late to save him? Had it already been too late before Rin even got him to the surface?

Nitori must have read his expression, because he spoke up.

"We can't quit, Rin-senpai. Remember our training. Once you start, you don't stop. Not until someone more qualified takes over."

Or the situation becomes unsafe to continue. Or if the people administering CPR became unable to continue due to exhaustion. That last one was seemed more likely than its predecessor. Rin could feel exhaustion tearing at him. He'd done what he could to dive down to the bus, but it had been too deep, and he didn't have any deepwater diving training. He'd only been able to get to the rapidly sinking bus twice, but had tried a third time, even when he knew he wouldn't make it. Then he'd swam partway down when during Tetsuya's last dive he'd been under so long that Rin knew something was wrong, and had to drag him back to the surface. That had taken its toll on him. Now Rin was starting to feel dizzy. Even though Nitori was breathing for Tetsuya, just giving chest compressions was becoming exhausting.

"Fight," Rin whispered, unsure if he was talking to himself or Tetsuya. "Don't give up. Fight through it."

Tetsuya remained unmoving and unconscious.

"Don't give up. Damn you, wake up!"

Sometime during their attempts to revive Tetsuya, the boat had started moving. They were nearing the shore and Rin could hear the sirens of an ambulance. That gave him heart. Help was near. The people who worked in the ambulance would have a greater arsenal of life saving tools, like adrenaline syringes and defibrillators. They would have a better chance of getting Tetsuya's heart started again, and getting him breathing.

Somehow, Rin managed to hold on until then, keeping up the rhythm of chest compressions, tenaciously refusing to give into exhaustion. Then, the next thing he knew, the paramedics had come aboard the boat and were pushing him back. Rin almost fought against them until he realized what was happening. Then he stumbled away, just far enough to make sure they had space, but close enough that he could still see Tetsuya clearly, blue lips and all, and if something happened, he was close enough to reach him.

And Nitori . . . God, when had Nitori turned into such a grown up? Because Nitori was calmly giving the paramedics a report on the situation, what had happened, how long Tetsuya had been under, how long they'd been trying to revive him, and then once that was finished, he started corralling the kindergarteners, getting them off the boat and away from Tetsuya and the paramedics, who were setting up a defibrillator, having decided immediately to try that considering what Nitori had told them.

Rin watched numbly as they shocked his younger friend. When that didn't produce a pulse, the medic administered a dose of pure adrenaline. Rin flinched and had to turn away when he saw them stab the needle directly into Tetsuya's chest, straight into his heart.

"Wake up," he whispered, or prayed. "Wake up. You can't die, Tetsuya. Wake the fuck up."

"Rin-senpai." Nitori was suddenly beside him. Through his numbness, Rin could feel Nitori's hand squeezing his arm. "It's going to be alright."

"You don't know that," choked Rin. "God. He's just a kid, Ai! He's too young for . . . And I owe him too much! Him and the others. If not for them, I would have never . . . He can't die. He just can't! Oh God, _what am I going to tell Haru?"_

"Don't give up on him, Rin-senpai," pleaded Nitori.

"Tetsuya's like his little brother now. If I let him die –"

"Please don't give up. Not until you know Kuroko-kun has," said Nitori. "If there's one thing we know about Iwatobi, it's that they're all capable of miracles, right?"

Miracles.

Funny things, those.

Rin hadn't ever given them much thought before now, not generally believing in them, but it was kind of true. When you looked at what Haru, Tetsuya, and the rest of the Iwatobi Swim Club had done, reviving their died out swim club, putting together a relay team that had the potential to make it to nationals, with a guy who'd only just learned to swim on it, then sacrificing that opportunity to instead heal Rin . . . and managing to heal him in and of itself was a miracle in itself.

And now, what Tetsuya had done today. Swimming deep was a completely different monster from swimming horizontally, and all Rin's training had been useless for it. He and Nitori alone couldn't have done what Tetsuya had. There weren't a dozen people in all of Japan who could have dived that deep repeatedly, and saved all those kindergarteners, as well as the bus driver. For Tetsuya to have been in just the right place, in just the right time to save them, that had been a miracle.

It would be too cruel if the only casualty this day was the one who'd saved them all.

"Tetsuya . . . wake up," Rin begged him.

Right as the paramedics shocked him again.

And it was as if Tetsuya had heard him.

The smaller boy sat upright with a scream, one hand flying up to try to bat away whatever he felt burning his chest, and coughing, up all the water he'd inhaled when he drowned.

"Tetsuya!" Rin charged forward, shoving aside a medic without even meaning to in order to get to the smaller boy's side faster.

Tetsuya continued coughing up water, gasping and choking on it. Rin grabbed his shoulders and kept him upright until he was done, then pulled him so that he was sitting upright, leaning back against his chest.

"Akashi-kun?"

"What? No, it's me. Rin."

"Oh." Tetsuya's voice was toneless, neither happy nor relieved. But he did relax slightly against Rin's chest, just for a moment, before jerking forward, tense again. "The children! The bus driver –"

"All safe. All alive," said Nitori.

"Everyone's alive," Rin said. Including you. You were the closest call, you idiot. Learn some self preservation!

But he didn't say everything he thought. He just wrapped his arms around the smaller boy tighter when Tetsuya relaxed back against him.

"You're alive," whispered Rin, finally able to relax a little bit himself. "You're going to be okay. Everything is going to be okay."

Miracles did exist. Rin knew that now for a fact.

* * *

(Title of this chapter is from the song by the band Live called "Overcome" whose lyrics fits this AU very well, I think.)

Sorry for the long wait, and for my absence recently. My life has been hectic for the past few months, but I'm working to ease back into the fandom now. :)

Please review!


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